Web content is the textual, visual or aural content that is encountered as part of the user experience on websites. It may include, among other things: text, images, sounds, videos and animations.
In Information Architecture for the World Wide Web, Lou Rosenfeld and Peter Morville write, "We define content broadly as 'the stuff in your Web site.' This may include documents, data, applications, e-services, images, audio and video files, personal Web pages, archived e-mail messages, and more. And we include future stuff as well as present stuff."
While the Internet began with a U.S. Government research project in the late 1950s, the web in its present form did not appear on the Internet until after Tim Berners-Lee and his colleagues at the European laboratory (CERN) proposed the concept of linking documents with hypertext. But it was not until Mosaic, the forerunner of the famous Netscape Navigator, appeared that the Internet become more than a file serving system.
A rating site (less commonly, a rate-me site) is a website designed for users to vote on or rate people, content, or other things. Rating sites are typically organized around attributes such as physical appearance, body parts, voice, personality, etc. They may also be devoted to the subjects' occupational ability, for example teachers, professors, lawyers, doctors, etc.
Rating sites typically show a series of images (or other content) in random fashion, or chosen by computer algorithm, rather than allowing users to choose. They then ask users for a rating or assessment, which is generally done quickly and without great deliberation. Users score items on a scale of 1 to 10, yes or no. Others, such as BabeVsBabe.com, ask users to choose between two pictures. Typically, the site gives instant feedback in terms of the item's running score, or the percentage of other users who agree with the assessment. They sometimes offer aggregate statistics or "best" and "worst" lists. Most allow users to submit their own image, sample, or other relevant content for others to rate. Some require the submission as a condition of membership.